11/18/2008

Fewer than half of violent crime solved in the UK

The detection rate for offences of violence against the person stood at just 49 per cent last year, according to official figures issued in a parliamentary answer.When Labour came to power almost three quarters of violent crimes were solved.The figures, which mean hundreds of thousands of victims of violent attacks do not see justice done every year, sparked a fresh row last night over policing priorities.Rank-and-file police leaders and opposition politicians claimed too much police time was now taken up with red tape or with chasing lesser crimes to hit Government targets.Shadow Home Secretary, Dominic Grieve, said: "It is bad enough that so much violent crime is being committed. It is a real insult to victims that over half of perpetrators are getting away with it. This is a direct result of Labour's target culture which has incentivised the police to pursue minor crimes over serious violent ones, and the reams of red that tie officers to their desks when the public want them out on the street." . . . .

This means that the rate of solving violent crimes has fallen by more than indicated here because the rate that people report crimes is related to how frequently they are solved. This is something that I show in Freedomnomics.